with him?"

"He's a nut," said Madge.

"Isn't he?" said Elsie and Gladys in chorus. These two very seldom
penetrated beyond the exclamatory interrogative.

"A nut, you think?" said Castleton. "A Brasilero of the old breed with
waxed pistachios and cocoanut-matted locks?"

"Oh, dry up," said Maurice. "I want the girls to look at this dancing
girl."

"No one couldn't stand in that p[)]s[=i]sh," said Jenny. "Could they,
Lilli?"

"Not very easily," the latter agreed.

"Really?" asked Maurice, somewhat piqued.

"Of course they could," Maudie contradicted.

"Certainly," said Irene, highly contemptuous.

"I say they couldn't then," Jenny persisted.

"She'd be a rotten dancer if she couldn't."

"I don't think so," Jenny said frigidly.

The girls unanimously attempted to get into the position conceived by
Maurice; but in the end they all had to agree that Jenny and Lilli were
right. The pose was impossible.

"Is that your mother?" asked Madge, pointing to Mona Lisa.

"Don't be silly, Madge Wilson," Jenny corrected. "It's a picture, and I
_don't_ think much of her," she continued. "What a terrible mouth! Her
hands is nice, though--very nice. And what's all those rocks at the
back--low tide at Clacton, I should think."

"But don't you like her marvelous smile?" asked Maurice.

"I don't call that a smile."

"I knew those flute-players annoyed her," said Castleton. "Down with
creative criticism. She's nothing but a lady with a bad temper."

"Of course she is," said Jenny.

"Would you smile, Jenny, if Ronnie here painted you with a gramophone
behind a curtain?"

"No, I shouldn't."

"Catch the fleeting petulance, and you become as famous as Leonardo, my
Ronnie."

Philip IV was voted a little love with rather too big a head, and the
Prince of Orange was a dear. Botticelli's Venus was not alluded to. The
acquaintanceship was not considered ripe enough to justify any comment
in that direction; although later on Jenny, her eyes pectinated with
mirth and flashing wickedly, sang, pointing to the embarrassed goddess:
"She sells seashells on the seashore." Primavera concluded the tour of
inspection, and by some Primavera herself was thought to be not unlike
Jenny.

"She's more like one of those angels with candles at Berlin," said
Ronnie Walker.

"Anyway," said Maurice, with a note of satisfaction, "she's a
Botticelli."

"Well, now you've all settled my position in life," said Jenny, "what's
Irene?"

But